Union of Independent Republics
The Union of Independent Republics or Independent AlliancesGears of War: Jacinto's Remnant pg 193 was the chief rival power to the Coalition of Ordered Governments during the Pendulum Wars for many natural resources. Little information is known about the Union other than that several famous members of the UIR were from the Ostri Republic and Pelles. The UIR used a mix of tactics to fight the COG, ranging from sabotage attacks on Imulsion pipelines in Sarfuth, to a fully mechanized army that fought COG troops at Aspho Fields. The UIR's greatest achievement was the creation of the Hammer of Dawn technology, which Chairman Tomas Dalyell wanted to capture and use to end the war. It is confirmed that the UIR was defeated by the COG, and the people of Sera enjoyed a new era of peace. The war was ended when the COG stole the Hammer of Dawn technology from the UIR and used it as a threat, therefore the Union of Independent Republics were forced to surrender, although it still took several years. The peace between the UIR and COG only lasted a few weeks before Emergence Day.http://gearsofwar.xbox.com/GOW2/TheGame.htm#/timeline/PendulumWarsEndGears of War: Jacinto's Remnant But some nations refused to surrender and resorted to guerrilla warfare.Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant pg 382 Unknown to the COG, some 4,000 UIR citizens survived Emergence Day and the Hammer of Dawn strikes by moving around the continent by sea. They possessed a submarine, a tanker, a frigate, some patrol boats and Imulsion Rig. They never joined the survivors at Jacinto as they did not believe they would be welcome there, but they met up with Jacinto's Remnant near the island of Vectes and joined them there. Part of the deal was that they join the COG in order to move into there, and they did at the agreement of Commander Miran Trescu, ending any possible future hostilities with the surviving members of the UIR. The survivors of the UIR later came to the aid of the remnants of the COG during the Second Battle of Azura and provided much-needed aid in the battle that ends the Locust War. History Age of Silence Pendulum Wars After Dr. Helen Cooper used the Lightmass Process to turn Imulsion into a valuable and limitless fuel, the global economy collapsed and Era of Silence with it. Only a few nations held vast Imulsion reserves while others had none of the new fuel. The UIR and the COG formed around this time period and soon the two superpowers fell into a global conflict fighting over Imulsion. The war was soon called the Pendulum Wars and the UIR fought the COG on vast fronts across Sera. For the next 79 years of the war, the UIR fought the COG for dominance of Sera and invaded poorer nations and colonizing them under the cloak of “protection”.Gears of War: Jacinto’s Remnant The UIR along with it socialist enemy the COG used the same military tactics that revolves around infantry based warfare. Eastern Front On the Eastern Front, where the Duke of Tollen's Regiment a COG military unit battled Gorasni soldiers under the banner of the UIR. The UIR achieved many military victories that lead to large numbers if Gears to be captured and sent to the Ramascu camp, a notorious POW camp ran by the Gorasni. Several Gears of the Duke of Tollen’s Regiment survived Ramascu and later retired to Vectes island, where the COG and later the Gorasni remnant relocated to in A.E 15, reopening old war scares from the death camps. Ostri Front Thirty years into the Pendulum Wars. The COG and the UIR engaged in trench warfare in the Ostri Republic. The Siege of Anvil Gate would later remind Cpt. Ranald F. Sander of the Ostri Front. Civil War Despite the COGs claimed that the UIR has lost their means to create the Hammer of Dawn after the COGs stole their research, it turned out the UIR had managed to successfully create the Hammer of Dawn under their secret space program. However, due to the repercussion of prolonged war, the UIR leadership decided not to launch the Hammer of Dawn much to the protest of military. When the UIR military had enough with the softness of the UIR administration, they tried to launch the Hammer of Dawn themselves, causing the small civil war between the military and the UIR administration. The Kashkur breakthrough In B.E. 27, the UIR had battle lines draw on western borders of Kashkur, a COG aligned nation, and both combatants were engaged in a stalemate. The UIR had loyal nation-states in the Eastern Central Massif but only the western borders of Kashkur were a frontline until neutral Vasgar failed to pay its Imulsion bills, indebted to both the COG and UIR which supplied fuel to Vasgar. The Unity Party wanted a vote of no confidence over the failure of passing a new budget. Facing the vote of confidence, President Ilim steps down from power and being replaced by an Acting President.Gears of War: Anvil Gate pg 94Gears of War: Anvil Gate pg 102 While his country entered into chaos UIR Chairman Vari ordered Furlin “peacekeepers” to occupy Vasgar so they could restore order. But the occupation was only meant to invade southern Kashkur and to capture one of Sera’s largest Imulsion reserves. One of Furlin’s armies attacked the city of Shavad while the Furlin's Third Infantry attack the fortress of Anvil Gate. The 26th Royal Tyran Infantry had companies defending Anvil Gate and Shavad. At Shavad, the UIR army made advances and pushed Howard Company out of the city and forced them to retreat to the main battle group. At Anvil Gate, the Fifteenth Furlin Cavalry was able to cutoff Anvil Gate and had prevented any reinforcements from entering Anvil Gate. For three months the UIR pounded the fort until Lt. Hoffman offered to surrender the fort. The UIR took the offer but it was a trap and over 200 Furlin soldiers were killed in the trap and the fort remained in COG hands. Eventually, COG reinforcements arrived to find the fort still in the COGs hand. UIR forces in all of Kaskhur was able to advance up till Ragani city where Gears led by Cpt. Adam Fenix was trying to keep the road open for the COG army. Fenix was able to single handily destroy a single Pariah Tank. And the Andius Fusiliers Regiment was able to arrive to help keep the road open for the COG. Sarfuth Aspho Point Two years before E-Day, the Pendulum Wars was still at a stalemate until Ostri scientist named Mauris Ivo made a breakthrough with satellite technology. This forced the COG and the UIR into an armed race with satellite-based weapons; the UIR was winning until the COG decided the break the mold of warfare and started using commandos to fight their wars instead of massive armies. The COG inserted a team at Aspho Point while C Company of the 26th Royal Tyrans defended Aspho Fields from Ostri troops. The raid ended with the COG gaining the UIR satellite technology and turning the war in the COG's favor. Surrendering to the COG After the final battle of the Pendulum Wars, an armistice was signed. Holdouts Even after the armistice was signed, few nations like Gorasnaya refused to surrender and continued a guerrilla war. E-Day Holdouts like Gorasnaya were attacked along with every other country across Sera. The Gorasni mainland was overrun and the remnant of the UIR held ports on the Seran mainland. The Gorasni, the last remnant of the UIR, was able to survive E-Day and the Hammer of Dawn Counterattack since the Locust could not sweep across the whole mainland. However, the Gorasni remnant would lose the cities of Chalitz and Meschov to the Stranded, forcing the UIR to fight both the Locust and their fellow Serans.Gears of War: Anvil Gate pg 258-259 The UIR remnant rallied around naval commander Miran Trescu who led the remaining 5000 Gorasni citizens from the ashes of the mainland. Fighting the Stranded and Unification with the COG Fifteen years after E-Day, the UIR remnant was settled in the Lesser Islands chain, where they faced a sea-based Stranded pirate group lead by Darrel Jacques. Darrel raided several UIR ships forcing Commander Miran Trescu to hunt him down and starting a war between the COG and Stranded.Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant pg 382 Trescu was able to track down Jacques who was in a prisoner swap with the Tyran-COG remnant, Trescu waited for the COG to give Jacques, and had his submarine the ''Zephyr to attack Darrel's ship, killing all the Stranded aboard. Trescu then made contact with the COG and entered negotiations. The Zephyr entered Vectes port and Trescu disembark to enter negotiations with Chairman Richard Prescott and Chief of the COG Defense Staff Col.Victor S. Hoffman on the UIR population. Trescu agreed to join the COG as citizens and abandon the UIR for safe passage and giving the COG the access the last Imulsion platform left on Sera the Emerald Spar Imulsion Platform. With a handshake, the last of the UIR was gone and joined the COG. But Trescu and his people would continue acting independent and treated their soldiers as a second army and ignored the COG chains of command and formed their own ghetto in New Jacinto. Eventually, the COG disbanded due to the Lambent Pandemic and the Gorasni returned to their own homeland, but still honored their alliance with the remnants of the COG and came to Delta Squad's aid in the Second Battle of Azura that ended both wars. After the end of the Locust War, the remnants of the UIR joined with the reconstituted COG to begin a joint rebuilding of civilization on Sera. The COG welcomed the contribution of the UIR's surviving technical knowledge and culture. As the COG, the UIR chose to abandon their previous cultural sights to forget about the horrors of the Locust War. 25 years after the Imulsion Countermeasure, much of the UIR's Pendulum era War Machine was left to rust. Foreign Policy The UIR was known to invade weaker nations of Sera that had some value to them, such as the South Islands or the Lesser Islands chain, the latter of which was rich in Imulsion. The UIR took advantage of Maranday neutrally to attack the coalition nation of Sarfuth.Gears of War: Aspho FieldsGears of War: Unseen When the Vasgar government was unable to resolve their economic problems and collapsed, the UIR sent "peacekeepers" into Vasgar and invaded Kashkur.Gears of War: Anvil Gate s]] Standards and Symbols Little is known of the UIR's iconography. The national flag is an orange lightning bolt, in an orange ring flanked by orange wings. The UIR emblem is depicted upon the left Bicep, and back of the UIR's infantry armor. In addition, black armbands with the UIR symbol drawn in red were worn over the left arms of UIR soldiers in armor. Society and Culture The UIR was a relatively loose collection of like-minded states, the majority of them were resource poor nations lacking in Imulsion. As such, the culture of the UIR was diverse and varied, but was unified through common grievances against the Imulsion-riched members of the COG such as Tyrus and Kashkur. On a whole, the UIR strived to outcompete the COG and developed several scientific advancements especially in the fields of space exploration and militarization. While the Hammer of Dawn was the most famous of the UIR creations, the UIR also had a matured Space Program, training Comonauts in the Cosmonaut Training Facility and preparing several expeditions, the most ambitious of them, being the expedition to the Moons of Sera. Some members such as the Republic of Gorasnaya had a incredibly martial and militaristic culture that, as Garron Paduk puts it, despise the concept of surrendering to an 'unjust peace' and would rather continue fighting a 'just war' Gearss 5. Pelles, which was the founder and one of the leading members of the UIR, was extremely aggressive and viewed the COG as an adversary. As such, Pelles' entire foreign policy rests on defeating the COG, through expansionism and realpolitik. On the other hand, certain territories of the UIR, especially those that was annexed such as Vasgar, was a tourist trap and were known to export Vasgari culture and technology in return for foreign direct investments. War Crimes The UIR nation of Gorasnaya housed several labor camps, most notably the Ramascu camp, where captured Gears from the Eastern Front were sent to. A large number of Coalition soldiers died in the camps including members of the Duke of Tollen's Regiment.Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant However, Major Toly and Cpt. Benoslau from the Independent Republic of Furlin would allow the civilians of Anvil Gate to escape the warzone and send wounded Gears to military hospitals rather than P.O.W. camps.Gears of War: Anvil Gate Member-States *Independent Republic of Furlin *Pelles *Ostri Republic *Republic of Gorasnaya *Republic of Lauczi *Vasgar (Occupied)Gears of War: Anvil Gate Weapons All weapons used by the UIR were merged with the COG after the Pendulum Wars. * Booshka * Breechshot * Gnasher * Hammer of Dawn (Helped create) * Lancer MK1 * Markza * Rocket Launcher * Snub * UIR Belt-fed machine gun * Mortar UIR Army The Army of the UIR was known to field large fleets of armored and infantry personnel. The UIR's most iconic and widespread vehicle utilized by the army were the Pariah main-battle tanks, of which hundreds of thousands were produced to invade, occupy or counterattaack neutral or COG-aligned states during the Pendulum Wars. Likewise, the infantry of the UIR unlike conventional COG Gears, were known to specialize in unconventional warfare such as guerilla tactics, espionage and subterfuge. Since the UIR was far more decentralized in structure compared to the COG, military equipment and weapons used by Indies varied from their respective region within the member-states of the UIR. Some within the army, used captured/copied armor from the COG (only repainted black to differentiate)Gears of War 2, others are scavenged from different military equipment from different states, however, the most utilized and well known is the standard-issue UIR infantry armor with its distinctive skull-like helmet. The army also had different branches that trained Indies in certain specialized tasks. The most infamous of which, were the training of the UIR Elite, which was the UIR Army's answer to the Coalition's Onyx Guards. The Elites were the strongest, most capable and deadly of the UIR and was extensively trained to counter COG special forces. The army was painted a light green with red and orange highlights in contrast to the silver and blue highlights used by the COG. UIR Navy The Navy of the UIR was known to be formidable enough to be an equal match to the COG Navy. What is known is that the navy from the UIR was adapt at utilizing its civilian Merchant fleets and weaponizing it for geopolitical gains. This civilian-military integration has made the UIR Navy feared by Coalition High Command due to the dual-use application that many of the Indie Merchant fleet presents itself. Ships such as RNV Borascu were known to ferry stolen COG technology such as the Silverback for research and development purposes''Gears 5: Some Assembly Required. It is for this reason that maritime security during the Pendulum Wars have been heightened to the point that Freedom of Navigation is non-existent. As such, civilian ships from either side such as Imulsion Tankers were targets during the Pendulum Wars. On the other hand, like the Army, the Indie Navy was diverse and decentralized in terms of ship/model procurement and production. The tactics used by the UIR Navy ranged from the conventional (large surface combat ships and underwater submarines) to the unconventional (fleet of suicide midget subs). Of all the member-states however, the UIR Navy was mainly comprised with vessels within the Gorasni Navy. UIR Air Force Little is known about the UIR Air Force. However, it is assumed that, like the Coalition of Ordered Governments Air Corps, the Union of Independent Republics Air Force comprised mainly on the production and utilization of Indie rotorcrafts such as the Khimera attack helicopter gunship and the UIR Transport Helicopter. These rotorcrafts in turn, would be lended out to other military service branches of the Union such as the UIR Army or as naval anti-submarine assets for the UIR Navy. The Air Force itself had its own sub-branches of military services, the most notable being the UIR Space Program. UIR Space Program The UIR Space Program falls directly under the full command of the UIR Air Force. This aerospace agency is responsible for the development, advancement and militarization of the Union's space ambitions. As the majority of the operatives in this sub-branch are former pilots of the Air Force, it is no wonder that sites like the Cosmonaut Training Facility is aimed at retraining former pilots for environments in space. The Space Program of the Union is noted to be far more advance than that of the COG. Launch sites such as OZP-11 in the occupied territory of Vasgar were known to develop advance UIR hard-suits for Cosmonauts to better handle the vast vacuum of spaceGears 5: Some Assembly Required. More importantly however, it is the UIR Space Program that was the chief procurer in the Hammer of Dawn program. At the height of the Pendulum Wars, the UIR developed Hammer of Dawn targeting beacons in which the three UIR Hammer of Dawn Satellites could accurately fire in a regional areaGears 5'': Some Assembly Required. Behind the scenes *The UIR troops wore armor that looked similar to the Gears standard issue armor but was black/gray instead of blue, and seemingly had slightly different helmets. *In Issue #7 of the Gears of War comic, the UIR soldiers are shown to have very different armor than the COG soldiers. It may be these Indies are from a different country to those seen in the opening cutscene of Gears of War 2. It is likely that Epic did not feel it necessary to create character models for the UIR in Gears of War 2 seeing as they would only be on screen for less than a minute. *In Gears of War: They Also Serve, an Indie tank gunner was also seen, and he didn't wear either armor type. *With the Slavic/Eastern European names of some UIR characters and terminology such as 'comrade' and 'cosmonaut', it can be viewed that the UIR is a loose reference to the Soviet Union. References Category:UIR Category:Organizations Category:Government